320 Food, 



verest weather, so lon<^ as we are able to keep the surface of the body 

 warm, we never suffer from the effects of cohl. Whilst on the other 

 hand, though the exhausting effects, which these hard working men 

 experience in summer-time, (when to keep the surface cool, is to 

 preserve the health and strength,) must be attributed, in some degree, 

 to the heating irritating property of this food upon the skin ; yet there 

 can be no question, I think, that it ought to be placed chiefly to the 

 account of its deficiency in nutriment ; for at this period, we find, 

 the miners purchase the finest wheaten bread they can procure. 



For, we know that the heat of the stomach and digestive organa 

 is the same in summer and winter, and therefore it seems very diffi- 

 cult, if not impossible to conceive, that there should be any diffe- 

 rence at these respective seasons, in the quantity of chyle produced, 

 from a given quantity of nutritive materials, or in the subsequent 

 process of assimilation, which operation effects the supply of the 

 fluids, and makes good the waste of the solids, of the bodies of ani- 

 mals. But one may readily see, how the heating property of 

 the oat cake, upon the skin in summer, may not only produce con- 

 stant irritation, but may contribute to increase the exhausting effect 

 of labour, at this season of the year, whilst the warmth which will 

 be constantly kept up, in this integument, in winter, by the use of 

 this species of food, will not only serve to defend the system at large, 

 from the debilitating effect of cold, but, on the same principle, make 

 up for the lessei: quantity of nutriment contained in it, in comparison 

 of wheaten bread. 



How far wheat might be found more nutritious than oats to Horses, 

 I cannot pretend to determine, because in these islands, it never 

 constitutes a part of their food ; but it is said to be often given to the 



